A HISTORY OF LONDON The licence of the bishop of London to Beatrice de Meaus in 1307 to live as an anchoress near the church of St. Peter Cornhill in a place where anchorites used to live before - proves that the cell was not then a new foundation.^' It was inhabited by Beatrice or by another woman in 1324,** but in 1345 and 1348 a male recluse was in possession. ^^ Mention is made in 1345 of an anchorite, and in 1 361 of an anchoress at St. Benet Fink.*^ A recluse called Lady Joan lived in St. Clement Danes in 1426." The anchoress at Allhallows London Wall, for whom the sum of 4 marks was received by the wardens of the church from the bishop of London in 1459,^ was succeeded in a year or two by an anchorite, William Lucas, who died about i486. The accounts of this church contain some inter- esting details concerning recluses of this kind. In these they figure not only as the recipients of ^ Lond. Epis. Reg. Baldock and Gravesend, fol. 9. " This might otherwise have been inferred from an inquisition of 1324, where the jurat! state that the house in which an anchoress lives was built eight years ago by the parishioners of St. Peter's Cornhill on the king's soil. Of course this would not make the date of foundation 1307, but there was often great vagueness as to time. Par/. R. (Rec. Com.), i, 419. " Ibid. " Sharpe, Ca/. of Wills, i, 483, 638. ^ Ibid, i, 483 ; ii, 107. " Nichols, Royal Wills, 250. ^ Churchwardens' Accts. of Allhallows, London WaU. charity but as contributors to the church. Among other sums given by Lucas are 31. ^d. to church work, 2s. 2>d. to 'ye makyng of ye new holies of laton of ye heme,' and 35. i^d. for painting the church. Simon, to whom the cell was granted after Lucas' death, gave to the church on one occasion a stand of ale, on another 32X. towards the new aisle, and in 1500— i he presented a chalice weighing 8 oz. An anchorite's servant probably had to be useful in many ways, for a payment is recorded to Simon's servant for plastering the church wall. Simon the Anker was the author of a treatise called The Fruit of Redemption, printed by Wynkyn de Worde in 1514. Since in 1532 a grant of the next presentation was made by the Court of Com- mon Council to an alderman, it must be concluded that the advowson of the cell then belonged to the City.^^ It appears to have been suppressed in 1538, the anker-house being given to the City swordbearer.'" There was also a cell attached to the Black- friars, and here Katharine Foster lived with her maid from 1471 to 1479.^^ It is believed that this house is identical with that inhabited before by an anchorite known as the hermit of New Brigge. The place must have been occupied until the Dissolution, for in 1548 Katharine Man, former recluse of the Blackfriars, relinquished her right to the anchoress-house to the commonalty and received a pension of 20sP
- ' Rec. of Corp. of Lond. Repert. viii, fol. 214^.
" Ibid. Repert. x, fol. 36^-37^. Steele, op. cit. 100. " Ibid. 588
